Well, he doesn't train any less than a lot of 7th dans I see wandering around, and they don't seem to have legitimacy problems - he'd probably be fine.

Best,

Chris

Fair enough. From what I've seen of the films on youtube, he did have some pretty fine skills in the day. Very direct and strong, probably wouldn't be too popular with some of the folk. The little bit of stuff I've seen of him with Anderson Silva looks like he's not lost too much in the way of timing and technique, although he has concealed it under a few layers of cheeseburger, not to mention the odd stuff. I can't complain there either, I am trying to work off a decade of not being on the mat myself, and the ukemi is slow coming back.

Lots of folk rest on their laurels. I dont blame them, 7th dan is no small acheivement. Doesn't seem to be the case in my dojo in general, but there are a few folk who have reached middling dan ranks who have just kinda shuffled themselves off into stagnancy and irrelevancy. Hope I dont do that. Who am I kidding, me getting to a middling dan rank, right.........